


Trifle Not With His Grave

by orphan_account



Category: The Magnus Archives (Podcast)
Genre: Background Martin Blackwood/Jonathan Sims, Betaed, Bittersweet, But its Self Comfort, Canon Compliant, Canon-Typical Worms, Eventual Happy Ending, Hurt/Comfort, Jane Prentiss (The Magnus Archives), Leitner Books (The Magnus Archives), Pining Martin Blackwood, Self-Indulgent, TMA, The Magnus Archives Season One, The Magnus Institute, by god he be digging, hole boy is buried aligned, hole boy origin story, neurodivergent character, well how do you think jane got into the tunnels?
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-20
Updated: 2020-04-29
Packaged: 2021-03-01 23:27:13
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 3,694
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23745286
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: This Buried avatar is just a hole boy who loves his holes!
Comments: 22
Kudos: 54





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Big thanks to my muse and beta, @itsybitsyblackwood on tumblr! Follow them for god-tier tma content uwu  
> https://itsybitsyblackwood.tumblr.com/

Occasionally people fall through the cracks in the world.

Hole Boy never fell. He crawled, quite intentionally, into the narrowest tunnel he could find, and then began to  _ dig. _ First with the hand spade from his grandma’s gardening kit and, when that shattered, with his own two hands. He clawed away clumps of dirt, pressing further and further into the safety of the earth, until there was nothing left of the terrifying, open world above - only the reassuring weight of the walls of his hole cradling him like a mother’s arms. Until he was so coated in grime that he could begin to forget his naked skin had ever existed. 

He didn’t stop.

_ Dig _ . The word sang through his mind joyously.  _ Dig. Dig. Dig.  _

Oh, to dig, to force oneself through the ground where nothing frightening could ever touch you! To become one with the earth, to relish in its embrace! It was a gift greater than life, a purpose greater than self, a need greater than breath. What was the passing of time when digging? Inconsequential! There was only earth and clawing and being held and  _ digging _ . 

When Hole Boy was just a boy, a small child trying to understand the world through a mind that seemed to process everything so differently from those around him, he had struggled to reconcile his need to be held with his need  _ not  _ to be touched. His frustrated caretakers had finally hit upon weighted blankets, and that had helped for a while. He’d spent long hours curled beneath his blanket, trying to feel safe. It had almost worked. But once he reached school age and had been forced to venture forth into the great wide world, he’d realized just how precariously he was situated. No one understood. No one  _ wanted  _ to understand. No one had time for a small boy who couldn’t stand the touch of skin but who needed closeness to stave off the soaring panic that always threatened to rip through his carefully placed mask. 

Books were a nice distraction. He collected them. Piled them around his bedroom, creating stacks to cramp a space that always seemed too open. He liked to learn. Having lots of thoughts about a few, specific subjects was another way for him to fill a space that was threateningly big. He liked to wander through narrow secondhand shops looking for cheap books to add to his collection. That was where he had found  _ the  _ book.

He liked it because of its simplicity. On the first page was a single word, three helpful letters placing a suggestion in his mind where nervousness had dwelled but moments earlier -  _ Dig.  _

_ Dig, dig dig,  _ he chanted inwardly, gleefully, as he continued to do just that. It was just him now, him and the dirt and the warm comforting love it emanated.  _ Dig, dig, dig _ \- until he was no longer traveling downward. There was rough stone beneath his hands, and though he scraped at it until his skin was torn and bleeding, it did not seem willing to budge. Hole Boy shivered. A draft? From where? He looked upward, but there was nothing but the imprint he had made through the dirt he’d crawled out of. He looked to the left and to the right. More dirt, ripe for digging. Yet there was a little breath of air that was less cloying than that he’d grown used to, and he wrinkled his nose. Didn’t like that too much. He wanted to be embraced by the hole without  _ and  _ within, wanted his lungs to feel the same cramped pressure he so treasured on his skin. Hole Boy wasted no time in burrowing into the dirt facing him, now moving more vaguely sideways than downward, not that direction really mattered in a hole. What mattered was the hole and the process of making it. Of digging it. 

_ Dig, dig, dig _ . 

_ Dig! _

And then - there was nothing to dig through. Open air met Hole Boy’s reaching fingers, and he recoiled with a hiss. He peered through this new hole - not the good kind of hole, with a satisfying darkness yet to be uncovered, but the kind of hole that revealed openness. Hole Boy looked disapprovingly at what lay before him. Not a hole, but a … tunnel? He hummed to himself, considering. 

Well, he finally decided, what was a tunnel if not a long hole? All he had to do was find a point at which he could extend the long hole, make it longer, perhaps, than ever before. The tunnel was almost wider than he would have liked, allowing a bit too much open air to touch him, but the comforting presence of its dark, rugged walls on either side helped anchor him. Even after taking his first, tentative step into the tunnel, he did not feel the panic  _ space  _ usually inspired. And so, with one hand pressed against the dirt to his side for reassurance, Hole Boy began his search for the perfect place to continue digging.

~~~

Hole Boy had been in the long hole for quite some time before he realized he could hear others somewhere up above. At first he attributed the occasional voices and footsteps to the general hub of London, but he eventually began to recognize the same sounds of the same people. One person more than the others.

Hole Boy had created quite a lovely pile of dirt at the entrance to the new hole, or rather the beginning of his hole extension, and he had taken to returning to it like a nest whenever the digging exhausted him. The pile was cozy and soft, and he was burrowing cheerfully into it for a bit of a recharge when he heard an all too familiar sound - the muffled chokes of someone who was crying and didn’t want anyone to know. 

Hole Boy frowned. The sound pricked something in his chest, awakened a feeling he had forgotten in his digging. Sadness? That was certainly the emotion of whoever it was on the other side of the wall of dirt beside him. Hole Boy rested his forehead against the wall as if offering support to the mysterious crier. Why were they sad? Hole Boy had spent a long time being sad and had spent a long time being alone. “Dig,” he whispered helpfully. That was the answer, he knew. Maybe if the crier started digging into the long hole, they would also leave behind such disheartening human emotions as sadness and loneliness.

The crier must not have heard him, for they continued to cry. They did, however, begin to speak, very quietly. Hole Boy listened intently, catching only a few words here and there, though he couldn’t be sure if that was due to the thickness of the wall or due to the very gentle hiccups that kept interrupting the crier. “... enough… it never is.”

Hole Boy nodded sympathetically. He related to that feeling. Or he had, once, before he had started digging. 

“I tried… three days… are you that hard to please, or is it just me?” 

Ouch. Hole Boy scuffed his hands in the dirt. He suddenly realized that maybe he was listening to something very private. Boundaries were hard. They were never as clear-cut as he wanted them to be, never as black and white as the line between hole and not a hole. He curled up in his pile again and closed his eyes, not wanting to intrude on whatever the crier was dealing with, but he couldn’t help hearing a final, mournful whisper from the person on the other side of the wall: “Tim and Sasha were right… I should let it go before I get hurt.”

Hole Boy eyed the wall doubtfully. It seemed a bit late for that, but what did he know? He closed his eyes and drifted into a peaceful dream about spades. 


	2. Chapter 2

Hole Boy was content. No one touched him in the long hole. He spent endless hours burrowing in the dirt with his hands, digging for as long as he liked, and when he needed to rest he had a beautiful pile of the same dirt waiting for him. He had never exulted like he did in the long hole, had never felt as free as he did when held close in its embrace. No one bothered him, tried to tell him he was wrong, tried to touch him. No one made him feel silly for the way he had focused so completely upon his goal of  _ digging _ . And, nearly as exciting, though not quite, was the fact that Hole Boy was fairly certain he was now in possession of a friend for the first time in his life!

Well, to Hole Boy, the sometimes-crying-sometimes-not voice on the other side of the wall was his friend. So far their friendship mostly consisted of the friend being alternately sad and hopeful about their feelings for someone named Jon, though from the sounds of it Jon didn’t appreciate the friend nearly enough, and Hole Boy listening and occasionally interjecting suggestions of the digging nature that the friend had not, yet, taken into consideration. Still, all in all, it was the most healthy friendship Hole Boy had ever had. He was of the general belief that the friend deserved great things and continued rooting for his relationship (question mark) with rude Jon. 

But mostly, he just continued to dig. 

He dug and he dug and he dug, unbothered and cheerful, until he dug right up to the feet of a strange but truly fascinating lady.

The first thing Hole Boy noticed about the lady was that she had quite the collection of holes herself. Only her holes seemed to be contained within her body, and they were full of a host of wriggling little worms.  _ Friends!  _ Hole Boy’s holes didn’t have worm friends. 

“I like your holes,” he said by way of introduction. “I’ve been working on my hole for quite some time.” 

The lady tilted her head. She was kind of pretty, insofar as Hole Boy considered people pretty. He attributed it to the holes. 

“It is a … nice … hole,” she said slowly. A few worms fell out of her mouth as she did so. Hole Boy smiled encouragingly. “May … I …. use the hole?”

Hole Boy’s smile vanished in an instant. Share his long, glorious hole? The pretty lady full of worms seemed nice enough, but some things were simply sacred. He shook his head and answered, quietly but resolutely, “No.” Then he resumed digging slightly to the left of the now crestfallen worm lady.

Even her worms seemed disappointed. They wriggled more droopily, one even oozing out of her eye and down her cheek like a tear. “But… my worms need more holes. The kind of holes they can only find in the Institute.”

“The Institute?” Hole Boy was curious despite himself.

The worm lady pointed vaguely in the direction of where the sounds of the outside world were most concentrated. “The Institute. Outside your … hole.”

Outside? Hole Boy shuddered at the reminder that such a cursed concept remained in existence. He continued clawing at the dirt before him. 

“I don’t know … how … to get to the Institute now,” worm lady was saying woefully. “All I know is … I  _ need  _ … to get there. For my worms.”

“And their holes?” Hole Boy thought he was starting to follow the logic.

Worm lady nodded. “They need … more … holes. I can give them so much but …” Another worm leaked from her eye socket. She turned away, reaching a hand up to touch the worm gently. “No one understands.”

Hole Boy began to experience a conflict of interests. On the one hand, the desire to protect his holes and save them all up just for himself was strong and tempting. But on the other hand, his awareness of both the feeling of being misunderstood and of wanting  _ more holes  _ wouldn’t allow him to ignore the worm lady’s sadness.

“You’d use my hole… once?” he asked tentatively.

The worm lady perked up slightly. “Only once,” she promised. “To get into the Institute.”

Hole Boy had to admit that her request was nothing short of reasonable. His hole would get to be admired by someone else, the worm lady would get more holes for her worms, and then they would both be left alone with their respective holes again. And Hole Boy might acquire another friend in the process. Or, as he pondered, watching the host of worms squirming throughout the lady’s body, several friends. 

“Okay,” he agreed finally. 

The worm lady looked nothing short of thrilled. “Thank you,” she said before she and her worms oozed down the hole in the direction of Hole Boy’s pile and, as he now knew, the Institute.

~~~

Hole Boy had once again forgotten about the passing of time as he dug contentedly, so he couldn’t say for sure how long it was before he heard voices somewhere very close behind him.

“Look, I’ll be fine, just keep moving,” the first voice gritted out. It was a stressed voice.

“Do you see anything up ahead?” asked the second. 

“No worms, just … darkness,” said the third. Hole Boy’s eyebrows shot up toward his hairline. Was it …? “Jon, here, just lean on me, it’ll be easier - ”

“I’m  _ trying,  _ but you’re moving too quickly,” snapped the first voice.

Hole Boy turned toward the voices, his suspicions quickly being confirmed. What was his friend and two other people, one of whom was apparently rude Jon, doing in his long hole?

“AH - shit! Tim!” the friend said, panicky, and the third, unknown person shouted. There was a wet blasting noise.

“Did you get them all?” asked rude Jon.

“I - I think so,” the other panted. “Damn these worms!”

Hole Boy frowned. What could his friend and his friends’ friends have against the worms? They were fairly polite from what he had gathered, and their affinity for holes was completely charming. He hesitantly crept toward the voices, wanting to catch a glimpse of his friend but afraid of being spotted and questioned. 

Hole Boy approached the bend in the hole that separated him from his three guests. He peeked around cautiously and caught a quick glimpse of three men - one holding some sort of canister, one leaning slightly against the side of another, much taller but much more anxious looking man. The third was trying to support the smaller man. Friend? Friend and Rude Jon? 

Hole Boy smiled.  _ Awwww. They’re bonding! _

And then several things happened at once. Out of the entrance of one of the many holes decorating the walls of the main, long hole, came a wave of glittering worms. The three men shouted collectively, and then disappeared in the cloud that poured from the canister. There were a lot of loud noises that made Hole Boy cringe back quickly, and a lot of movement that ended with none of the men still standing in Hole Boy’s line of vision but an impressive amount of worms cascading through the holes.

Hole Boy was beginning to wonder if he had made a mistake in sharing his hole.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks once again to my muse and beta, @itsybitsyblackwood on tumblr, and for whichever angel brought this fic to glumshoe's attention.

There was far too much happening in Hole Boy’s long hole. He could feel his breath coming quicker, more shallow, and his heartbeat was hurting his ears. The urge to burrow deep into the dirt and curl into a tight ball in the earth’s embrace was overwhelming, but the chaos happening so close by would, he feared, intrude even on the safety of a new hole. And there was a thought nagging at the back of his mind, trying hard to shout over the rest of the noise.

The friend had been scared. The friend had been scared before, of course, but never like this. Never had Hole Boy heard the immediate kind of high pitched fear as had been in the friend’s voice when the worms made their appearance. That, Hole Boy was certain, couldn’t be good. But he was so confused. The worm lady and her worm friends had seemed pleasant before. Why was the friend afraid of them? Was there something Hole Boy was missing? The feeling of not having all the information, of looking at a puzzle but not knowing how the pieces fit together to make the picture everyone else saw, was growing alarmingly high. And that, Hole Boy decided, was simply not allowed. This hole was for digging and for safety and for happiness. He would march right up to the worm lady, tell her to get her worms out of his hole and not come back, help the friend, Rude Jon, and the stranger get back into the Institute, and resume digging like none of this had ever happened.

That was the plan, at least.

Really, Hole Boy had only crept shyly down a few meters before he heard a distant shout, lots of whooshing noises, a quick burst of sharp voices, and then - silence. Even the worms at his feet stopped wriggling. Everything fell still and quiet, just as it should be. Hole Boy smiled. Peace at last. 

However… he couldn’t shake a nagging sense of unease. He stood unmoving and pondering for a few minutes. He had one thought and it was filling up his head, even the places usually reserved for his unending mantra of  _ dig, dig, dig _ . He was thinking about his friend. Hole Boy sighed. He needed to make sure the friend was okay, that he wasn’t scared anymore and that he was safely back in the Institute. 

So he set off, slow and cautious, in search of his frightened friend.

~~~

It was a good thing that Hole Boy had decided to find the friend because he was certain that he would have been lost in the long hole for far longer alone. He had managed to wander so far into the series of holes that Hole Boy himself spent quite some time tracking him down. When he finally located him, the friend was sitting with his back against the dirt wall, hugging his knees against his chest and, almost imperceptibly, rocking back and forth.

Hole Boy felt a pang at the familiar position. He approached carefully, so quietly that the friend didn’t seem to notice until he was but a few meters away.

“S-stop!” the friend cried, scrambling to his feet. “Who are you?”

Hole Boy held up one wary hand. “Friend.”

“Who are you?” the friend repeated.

Hole Boy tilted his head. What a good question. He wasn’t sure he had an answer the friend would understand. So he asked instead, “Who are  _ you _ ?”

“M-Martin,” the friend stammered.

“Mahhtin,” Hole Boy repeated. He liked the way the word felt in his mouth. It was friendly. Like the friend. Now that he was so close to him, he could see the general friendliness of his entire shape. He looked cozy, and his face was streaked with dirt… but also tears. “You’re lost.”

Martin looked uncertain, but he nodded all the same.

“I can help,” Hole Boy said. He stepped closer, arranging what he hoped was an encouraging smile across his face. 

“You know your way around these damned tunnels?”

Ouch. “My hole.”

“Your… did you make these?”

“Some,” Hole Boy said modestly.

Something frantic energized Martin’s figure and he took a quick half step toward Hole Boy. “Do you know where Tim and Jon went? Are they okay? Did -”

“Institute,” Hole Boy said. “I can take you to Rude Jon.”

“Rude … hang on!” Martin wrung his hands together. “You can take me back?”

Hole Boy nodded patiently. “But… promise.”

“Promise what?” 

“You can’t tell… Rude Jon or… anyone that I’m here,” Hole Boy said seriously. “My hole. I’m digging. Alone.”

Martin looked around helplessly. “You live here?”

“My. Hole.”

“All right, all right, that seems… fair enough, I suppose.” Martin shrugged, looking lost and even more anxious than he generally sounded through the walls. “So you’ll take me to the Institute and I’ll just … say I found my own way out. I’ll keep your secret, yeah.”

Hole Boy knew he could trust the friend. They were friends for a reason, after all. “Follow me,” he said, and began to lead Martin back toward the Institute.

Martin followed closely, rubbing and squeezing his hands continuously. He practically vibrated with unease. Had the worms shaken him up that badly? Perhaps he missed Rude Jon. They had seemed quite close before. Hole Boy hummed to himself and thought about what kind of poetry the friend might write about Rude Jon after this adventure. 

By the time Martin was safely returned to the Institute, Hole Boy was exhausted. His pile of dirt was calling him, tempting him to a nice, long nap. He made his way back to his cozy pile and burrowed into it blissfully, feeling that it had been, all in all, a successful day, if a little short on the digging. He drifted off into a peaceful slumber.

But it did not, unfortunately, last long enough.

He was awakened by the sounds of several loud voices and the tramping of booted feet through his quiet hole.  _ What…?  _ Hole Boy scrambled up, looking around nervously. There wasn’t anyone within sight, but he could hear what sounded like upwards of a half dozen people making their way through his home. This wouldn’t do at all. Digging was meant to be a relaxing activity, and there was nothing relaxing about having this much company around. Hole Boy stood frozen for a few moments, listening, before he came to a quick decision.

He headed down his long hole in the opposite direction of the voices. He moved swiftly but quietly toward the furthest dead end he knew of. He could begin a new hole, have a fresh start away from the Institute and worms and noise. He felt a twinge of sadness at the thought of leaving Martin behind though. He could always come back to visit, maybe, check in and see how his friend was doing someday. 

But he was sure that he and Martin would both be okay. Martin had Rude Jon. And Hole Boy - well, Hole Boy always had  _ digging _ . 


End file.
